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Choose My Adventure: Have ship, will travel

As I wrap up my Imperial Agent's personal story on Dromund Kaas, I can't help but be excited by all the new toys I have at my disposal in Star Wars: The Old Republic. At level 15, I was able to purchase a speeder, which helped travel tremendously, but now, at level 17, I have my very own ship that acts as housing (kinda) and a way to participate in space missions.

Xel'es is heading to Korriban next, but he needs a bit of guidance. Follow along with his story after the cut and be sure to vote for his next moves!

I returned to Imperial Intelligence Headquarters to meet with Keeper and Watcher Two to give them news of my success at Lord Grathan's Estate. On the way up, Minder Five met with me to discuss Samara Mindak and the reason I had to eliminate her. The Imperial council agreed that her execution was appropriate and necessary for public safety, but I'm to keep my distance from the Mindak family until the investigation is complete. Hey, no problem there.

Keeper stormed into the office shouting about how we need to strike against the dissidents right away. The troublemakers discovered a way to infiltrate the ancient power conduits that run beneath the capital near a dark Sith temple that contains force-driven powers. When the Empire discovered this, it contained the powers out of respect to the Sith, but the rebels wanted to unleash it. The Sith, being the Sith, decided that it might be a good idea to head in there looking for ancient relics before anyone else soils their holy junk, but they unwittingly unleashed an ancient Sith lord named Lord Kallig. Kallig's power was seeping into the workers' brains, causing them all to be so overwhelmed with power that they all believed they were Sith Lords themselves. As you can imagine, too many Sith Lords in one location can cause quite the ego storm; they were actually plotting little wars against each other. That was something I couldn't wait to see for myself.

Of course, Keeper wanted to run an elimination squad in there, but Darth Jadus shot that idea down. The Dark Temple is sacred ground and is not to be unduly disturbed by too many curious troopers, so I had to do the job with only Kaliyo.

As I approached the Dark Temple, I met with some troops stationed in the small Outpost Warden just outside the temple's reach. A man named Captain Fizik warned me that when people enter the temple, they don't come back. He explained a bit more to me about the possessed slaves and the problems they're causing for the Empire's research. Also, Lord Kallig was apparently not the only Sith Lord who was buried beneath the temple. If the other Sith Lords were awakened in the same manner, we could all say goodbye to this jungle planet once and for all.

I made good use of my stealth generator to sneak past most of the possessed crew and trooper guardians once I was inside the temple. It really did pain me to see the Empire's good men in a position where they posed a threat to me, but I kill whom I need to kill to complete my assignment. These men were probably past the point of no return, anyway. Ancient Sith magic is powerful, and not always in a good way.

Once inside the central chambers, I disabled all three of the detonator charges that Keeper mapped out for me. Fortunately, this otherwise menial task was brightened up a bit by a few of the "Sith Lords" I met along the way. One Twi'lek peon decided that he was going to give me commands as if he were some sort of high-ranking lord, and another man named Dorian told me that he was the master of the undying darkness. But I called his bluff when I pointed out that he was still wearing his slave collar. It turned out that this nutjob actually held the key to the datacores that Captain Fizik asked me to find, so I humored the madman a bit.

I recovered a handful of his power symbols from some possessed troopers, and in return, he agreed to give me the data I needed. But one final request from Dorian amused me to no end. He actually asked that I order more slaves into the temple for his own sick power trip. The man admitted he's not actually a lord, but he wanted more subjects to rule over. This was the only way he could get them. A slave leading the slaves -- interesting concept. Of course, I agreed, and once I returned to the captain, I put in the order. Heck, it might even turn out to be a better gig for the slaves anyway if they'd rather listen to the musings of a lunatic than actually do back-breaking work.

As I returned to Keeper for some much-deserved praise on a job well done, I was surprised to find the imperial command post scrambling. Apparently, there was a simultaneous attack on Kaas City just as I was working so hard to thwart the explosions in the temple. I'm not sure whether those rebels could be that clever or it was just a coincidence, but reports held that there was an explosion on Darth Jadus' flagship. He was showing off his "grand vision" to some military personnel, civilians, and other Sith, but Watcher Two told me that they're all dead, including Darth Jadus.

I sat down with Keeper to discuss the future of our mission and possibly our careers. With Jadus gone, we'd expect a mad rush to fill his spot, which would make our jobs even more difficult. Not only would we deal with business as usual, but we'd also need to do some heavy duty intelligence research on any potential candidates for the darth's job.

Watcher Two interrupted to let us know that she was picking up a holo broadcast coming through to every Imperial station. A man by the name of "The Eagle" issued a call to arms and took responsibility for the death of Jadus. Of course, this set Keeper off on an emotional agenda I've never seen him display before: jaded and calculated revenge. He briefed me on a new mission to eliminate The Eagle in his nest. To increase my covert role, Keeper told me that I will now be known only as Cipher 9. The Cipher agents are faceless and nameless, so this was to be my new complete identity. The new title came with a promotion and a rank increase, but no word yet on a pay increase. I hope the medical benefits are at least a bit better.

Watcher Two will remain my HQ liaison, and in possibly the best news I've heard in months, I'll be assigned my very own starship. The X-70 Phantom is a sleek little beauty, and I'm excited to call it my home for as long as is required, which is exactly why I'm sitting here, relaxing in my captain's chair and writing this. I'll head out to my next assignment on Korriban soon enough, but first, I may take the ship's 2V-R8 droid up on its offer to give me a foot massage.

Whatdya say, Kaliyo? Make it a double?

For this week's polls, I want you to choose my main companion this week, now that the 2V-R8 Imperial ship droid is available, and I want to revisit Xel'es' Dark Side/Light Side affiliation. A person's outlook may change a bit as they have more battlefield experience, so I wanted to offer that up as an option. Right now, I'm choosing only Dark Side choices.

Make sure to get your votes in by Friday, January 4th, at 12:01 a.m. EST. %Poll-79847%%Poll-79855%It's Shawn's turn back in the driver's seat of Choose My Adventure with you as the co-pilot. It's going to be a rough ride, so put on your seat belt! If you want to read a full six weeks of farcical puns about cars and farming, be sure to tune in every Wednesday as the adventure continues to unfold.